The peacock, though not a native, is reared in all parts; it bears the name of kung tsioh, sometimes rendered ‘Confucius’ bird,’ though it is more probable that the name means the great or magnificent bird. The use of the tail feathers to designate official rank, which probably causes a large consumption of them, does not date previous to the present dynasty. Poultry is reared in immense quantities, but the assortment in China does not equal in beauty, excellence, and variety the products of Japanese culture. The silken cock, the vane of whose plume is so minutely divided as to resemble curly hair, is probably the same sort with that described by some writers as having wool like sheep. The Mongols succeed very well in rearing the tall, Shanghai breed, and their uniform cold winter enables them to preserve frozen flesh without much difficulty. The smaller gallinaceous birds already described, grouse, quails, francolins, partridges, sand-snipe, etc., amount to a score or more species, ranging all over the Empire. The red partridge is sometimes tamed to keep as a house bird with the fowls. The Chinese quail (Coturnix) has a brown back, sprinkled with black spots and white lines, blackish throat and chestnut breast. It is reared for fighting in south China, and, like its bigger Gallic rival, is soon eaten if it allows itself to be beaten.
FAMILY OF WADERS IN CHINA.
The widespread family of waders sends a few of its representatives from Europe to China, but most of the members are Oriental. The marshes and salt lakes of Mongolia attract enormous numbers of migratory birds in summer to rear their young in safety, in the midst of abundant food. Col. Prejevalsky watched the arrival of vast flocks early in February, and thus describes their appearance: “For days together they sped onward, always from the W.S.W., going further east in search of open water, and at last settling down among the open pools; their favorite haunts were the flat mud banks overgrown with low saline bushes. Here every day vast flocks would congregate toward evening, crowding among the ice; the noise they made on rising was like a hurricane, and at a distance they resembled a thick cloud. Flocks of one, two, three, and even five thousand, followed one another in quick succession, hardly a minute apart. Tens and hundreds of thousands, even millions of birds appeared at Lob-nor during the fortnight ending the 21st of February, when the flight was at its height. What prodigious quantities of food must be necessary for such numbers!”[196] Wading and web-footed birds all harmlessly mix in these countless hosts, but hawks, eagles, and animals gather too, to prey on them.
Among the noticeable waders of China, the white Manchurian or Montigny crane is one of the finest and largest; it is the official insignia of the highest rank of civilians. Five species of crane (Grus) are recognized, and seven of plovers, together with as many more allied genera, including an avocet, bustard, and oyster-catcher. Curlews abound along the flat shores of the Gulf of Pechele, and are so tame that they race up and down with the naked children at low tide, hunting for shell-fish; as the boy runs his arm into the ooze the curlew pokes his long bill up to the eyes in the same hole, each of them grasping a crab. Godwits and sandpipers enliven the coasts with their cries, and seven species of gambets (Totanus) give them the largest variety of their family group, next to the snipes (Tringa), of which nine are recorded. Herons, egrets, ibis, and night-herons occur, and none of them are discarded for food. At Canton, a pure white egret is often exposed for sale in the market, standing on a shelf the livelong day, with its eyelids sewed together—a pitiable sight. Its slender, elegant shape is imitated by artists in making bronze candlesticks. The singular spoonbill (Platalea) is found in Formosa, and the jacana in southwestern China. The latter is described by Gould as “distinguished not less by the grace of its form than its adaptation to the localities which nature has allotted it. Formed for traversing the morass and lotus-covered surface of the water, it supports itself upon the floating weeds and leaves by the extraordinary span of the toes, aided by the unusual lightness of the body.”[197] Gallinules, crakes, and rails add to this list, but the flamingo has not been recorded.
In the last order, sixty-five species of web-footed birds are enumerated by naturalists as occurring in China. The fenny margins of lakes and rivers, and the seacoast marshes, afford food and shelter to flocks of water-fowl. Ten separate species of duck are known, of which four or five are peculiar. The whole coast from Hainan to Manchuria swarms with gulls, terns, and grebes, while geese, swans, and mallards resort to the inland waters and pools to rear their young. Ducks are sometimes caught by persons who first cover their heads with a gourd pierced with holes, and then wade into the water where the birds are feeding; these, previously accustomed to empty calabashes floating about on the water, allow the fowler to approach, and are pulled under without difficulty. The wild goose is a favorite bird with native poets. The reputation for conjugal fidelity has made its name and that of the mandarin duck emblems of that virtue, and a pair of one or the other usually forms part of wedding processions. The epithet mandarin is applied to this beautiful fowl, and also to a species of orange, simply because of their excellence over other varieties of the same genus, and not, as some writers have inferred, because they are appropriated to officers of government.
The yuen-yang, as the Chinese call this duck, is a native of the central provinces. It is one of the most variegated birds known, vieing with the humming-birds and parrots in the diversified tints of its plumage, if it does not equal them for brilliancy. The drake is the object of admiration, his partner being remarkably plain, but during the summer season he also loses much of his gay vesture. Mr. Bennet tells a pleasant story in proof of the conjugal fidelity of these birds, the incidents of which occurred in Mr. Beale’s aviary at Macao. A drake was stolen one night, and the duck displayed the strongest marks of despair at her loss, retiring into a corner and refusing all nourishment, as if determined to starve herself to death from grief. Another drake undertook to comfort the disconsolate widow, but she declined his attentions, and was fast becoming a martyr to her attachment, when her mate was recovered and restored to her. Their reunion was celebrated by the noisiest demonstrations of joy, and the duck soon informed her lord of the gallant proposals made to her during his absence; in high dudgeon, he instantly attacked the luckless bird which would have supplanted him, and so maltreated him as to cause his death.
BEALE’S AVIARY.
The aviary here mentioned was for many years, up to 1838, one of the principal attractions of Macao. Its owner, Mr. Thomas Beale, had erected a wire cage on one side of his house, having two apartments, each of them about fifty feet high, and containing several large trees; small cages and roosts were placed on the side of the house under shelter, and in one corner a pool afforded bathing conveniences to the water-fowl. The genial climate obviated the necessity of any covering, and only those species which would agree to live quietly together were allowed the free range of the two apartments. The great attraction of the collection was a living bird of paradise, which, at the period of the owner’s death, in 1840, had been in his possession eighteen years, and enjoyed good health at that time. The collection during one season contained nearly thirty specimens of pheasants, and besides these splendid birds, there were upward of one hundred and fifty others, of different sorts, some in cages, some on perches, and others going loose in the aviary. In one corner a large cat had a hole, where she reared her young; her business was to guard the whole from the depredations of rats. A magnificent peacock from Damaun, a large assortment of macaws and cockatoos, a pair of magpies, another of the superb crowned pigeons (Goura coronata), one of whom moaned itself to death on the decease of its mate, and several Nicobar ground pigeons, were also among the attractions of this curious and valuable collection.
Four or five kinds of grebe and loon frequent the coast, of which the Podiceps cristatus, called shui nu, or ‘water slave,’ is common around Macao. The same region affords sustenance to the pelican, which is seen standing motionless for hours on the rocks, or sailing on easy wing over the shallows in search of food. Its plumage is nearly a pure white, except the black tips of the wings; its height is about four feet, and the expanse of the wings more than eight feet. The bill is flexible like whalebone, and the pouch susceptible of great dilatation. Gulls abound on the northeast coasts, and no one who has seen it can forget the beautiful sight on the marshes at the entrance of the Pei ho, where myriads of white gulls assemble to feed, to preen, and to quarrel or scream—the bright sun rendering their plumage like snow. The albatross, black tern, petrel, and noddy increase the list of denizens in Chinese waters, but offer nothing of particular interest.[198]